Douglas Goldstein, CFP®, is an investment advisor, president of Profile Investments (www.profile-financial.com) and host of the personal financial radio show, Goldstein on Gelt. Buy his new book on Kindle: Building Wealth: Investing in Stocks. Securities are offered through Portfolio Resources Group, Inc., Member FINRA, SIPC, MSRB, SIFMA. Accounts carried by Pershing LLC., Member NYSE/SIPC, a subsidiary of The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation. He can be reached at doug@profile-financial.com. Follow Doug on Twitter: @DougGoldstein.

InfoBarrel is a writing platform for non-fiction, reference-based, informative content. Opinions expressed by InfoBarrel writers are their own.

Having the proper tools makes cleaning the floor painless.

With wall-to-wall carpeting, 4 children, frequent visitors, and working full-time, we didn’t have the time to vacuum as often as we should, and our carpet was covered with lint, crumbs, and other evidence of a busy life.

Roomba was a welcome addition to our family.

Better than a pet (no need to train), more willing to help than a child (it never complains about being asked to vacuum), and easy to use, Roomba quickly took charge of keeping the floors in our house clean.

How does it work?

When you first open the package, you need to charge Roomba for 24 hours. Then, it’s as simple as putting it in the room you want cleaned and pressing a button.

The first few times Roomba vacuums, it’s hard to resist the urge to sit and watch. I often found myself cheering as it successfully managed to scoop up an offending piece of dirt.

While the pattern Roomba creates on the floor seems pretty random, it is programmed to avoid obstacles and cover the area in between. If chairs are pushed around the table, it may take a few extra minutes for Roomba’s brushes to go around every chair leg, but eventually, it gets the job done.

Some models come with an invisible wall that you can set up to prevent Roomba from entering a certain area. Otherwise, you can make a physical barrier.

Occasionally Roomba will get stuck or experience some other problem, and it will cheerfully call out the error and wait patiently for you to adjust it.

Overall, the amount of time to set up, adjust if need be, and empty its trash bin, is far shorter than it would take to vacuum the room by yourself.

And if you would like, there is even an option to program Roomba to work when you are out of the house or asleep!

Skeptics enjoy pointing out a spot that Roomba might have missed, but then there is a special “dirt sensor” setting that you can use to employ Roomba to clean a small area.

Furthermore, since it is so easy to use Roomba, you can use it daily (or even twice a day).

The price?

While Roomba may be a bit pricey, I have found that it is worth every penny, since in addition to cleaning the floor, it also provides entertainment, and gives you the gift of time. And that in and of itself is priceless.

A tip for choosing which model Roomba is best for you:

If you don’ t have pets in your house, but if you have girls with long hair, consider buying the pet edition. This way, you won’t need to clean the brushes as often.

How to make Roomba work even more efficiently

Roomba will work fine vacuuming its way around toys on the floor and chairs pushed out from the table, but if you take a few minutes to clean up the floor clutter, Roomba can work more efficiently. Furthermore, as an added boon, since the floor will be cleared off, your room will look that much neater!

Cleaning can be time consuming, but when you have the proper tools, it can be done quicker…especially if Roomba does the work for you.

The most important lesson I learned from Roomba?

When you’re done with the job, sing a song and show pride in your work! No matter how many times I push the “start” button, Roomba takes off with a little jig and sings a song. And when it finishes, it chirps a song of glee.

Just do something productive with the extra time you gain by having Roomba work for you. Perhaps singing lessons?